Clarence Darrow
Clarence Darrow
Clarence Seward Darrowwas an American lawyer, leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union, and prominent advocate for Georgist economic reform. He was best known for defending teenage thrill killers Leopold and Loeb in their trial for murdering 14-year-old Robert "Bobby" Franks. Some of his other notable cases included defending Ossian Sweet, and John T. Scopes in the Scopes "Monkey" Trial, in which he opposed William Jennings Bryan. Called a "sophisticated country lawyer", he remains notable for his wit, which...
ProfessionLawyer
Date of Birth18 April 1857
CityKinsman, OH
The law is a horrible business.
The ablest lawyers are always associated with the biggest fees.
Lawyers are natural politicians.
Most lawyers only tell you about the cases they win. I can tell you about some I lose. A lawyer who wins all his cases does not have many.
No man is a good citizen, a good neighbor, a good friend, or a good man just because he obeys the law. The intrinsic worth is determined mainly by the intrinsic make-up.
Laws have come down to us from old customs and folk-ways based on primitive ideas of man's origin, capacity and responsibility.
Freedom comes from human beings, rather than from laws and institutions.
Some false representations contravene the law; some do not. The law does not pretend to punish everything that is dishonest. That would seriously interfere with business, and, besides, could not be done. The line between honesty and dishonesty is a narrow, shifting one and usually lets those get by that are the most subtle and already have more than they can use.
Inside every lawyer is the wreck of a poet.
Laws should be like clothes. They should be made to fit the people they are meant to serve.
The trouble with law is lawyers.
I have lived my life, and I have fought my battles, not against the weak and the poor - anybody can do that - but against power, against injustice, against oppression, and I have asked no odds from them, and I never shall.
We are born and we die; and between these two most important events in our lives more or less time elapses which we have to waste somehow or other. In the end it does not seem to matter much whether we have done so in making money, or practicing law, or reading or playing, or in any other way, as long as we felt we were deriving a maximum of happiness out of our doings.
There is no such thing as justice - in or out of court.